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Berezkin/Duvakin Catalogue of Motifs
English translation, enhancements and additional metadata by Jonathan Fielder-White
Source: Berezkin and Duvakin's Analytical Catalogue · Original catalogue (Russian)
About the catalogue and its sources
Unless otherwise stated, narrative and tradition data comes from Berezkin and Duvakin's Thematic classification and distribution of folklore and mythological motifs by area (Analytical catalogue).
Original Berezkin/Duvakin catalogue (Russian)
The English translation uses AI assistance alongside manual verification. Errors may occur; consult the original source when in doubt.
M - Adventures: Tricks and episodes
| Ref ▲ | Title | Summary | Traditions | Narratives |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| M57d2 In M57 family | The tree makes wishes come true | The man was about to cut down a tree. It himself, or the creature living on it or in it, asks not to do so and fulfills the person's wishes. | 25 | 32 |
| M57d3 In M57 family | Wind donor | A person receives a reward from a character who is associated with the wind. Cf. Motive K175 (“The wind carried away the flour”). | 25 | 29 |
| M57d4 In M57 family | Frost donor | A person receives a reward from a character who is associated with frost. | 14 | 15 |
| M58 | A trail or bush saves you from the heat | The earth is burning, the fire is chasing the character. A number of elements and objects refuse to cover him, saying they will burn or heat up; the last in the row shelters him. The earth cools down, the character leaves the shelter. | 16 | 25 |
| M59 | An insidious passenger kills a carrier, K952.1. | A small animal asks a large one to transport it across the river; consistently rejects all the seats on the carrier's body that he offers; climbs to where the carrier is You can kill when the crossing is over. | 29 | 26 |
| M59a In M59 family | Porcupine at the crossing | After asking a large animal to transport it across the river, a porcupine kills or damages it. See M59 motif. | 18 | 1 |
| M60 | Imaginary physician: finished off enemy, K824, K1955 | After injuring a demon (robber), the hero goes to his locus. There he, or (rarely) his assistant, pretends to be a doctor and finishes off an opponent. | 38 | 64 |
| M60a In M60 family | The hunter comes to the one he wounded | The creature/character runs away or swims away with a hook, harpoon, arrow, or other object thrown by the hero in his body. Local shamans can't heal an existence/character. The hero or his friend comes to the wounded man's village, takes out the object that caused the injury, or drives him even deeper into the body. The patient recovers or dies accordingly. See L105 and M60 motifs. | 53 | 53 |
| M60a1 In M60 family | The shepherd explains how to cross | The hero meets a servant (usually a shepherd) and takes his form, after asking how he acts, how he talks to the hostess (usually finds out what to say in order transport the herd across the river). | 16 | 19 |
| M60a2 In M60 family | The imaginary servant licks his heels | The servant must lick the master or mistress's feet or wound. The hero comes disguised as a servant and instead of licking his heels, touches them with the animal's cut off tongue. | 18 | 19 |
| M60a3 In M60 family | The Imaginary Physician: Punishing a Scoundrel | Avenging the seized property (a pet or a bird), the hero repeatedly comes to the offender in different guises (girl, doctor, etc.) and brutally mocks him. | 4 | 4 |
| M60b In M60 family | Imaginary doctor: finishing off the victim | The deceiver, promising to cure a wounded or sick person, finishes him off and eats him or offers a remedy that is only worse for him. | 48 | 92 |
| M60b1 In M60 family | The crow eats fish | The crow promises to cure the fish, and eats it herself. | 2 | 5 |
| M60b2 In M60 family | To make the bear beautiful, ATU 8 | A large predator asks (agrees with the proposal) to make his skin beautiful (variegated). The deceiver burns it (scalds it, burns his eyes, etc.). | 10 | 14 |
| M61 | Incitement to quarrel (by words), K1084, ATU 1577 | The character provokes a quarrel by telling each of his opponents how one of them allegedly used hostile or offensive language towards the other. | 53 | 51 |
| M61a In M61 family | Owners quarrel to get valuables | To get valuables, the character provokes a quarrel between their owners. When they start fighting each other, valuables fall out of their bodies and end up at the character's disposal. | 10 | 14 |
| M61a1 In M61 family | The character quarrels birds | The character (always a raven) provokes a seagull to quarrel with another bird, telling each one that the other was hostile or offensive towards her. | 5 | 9 |
| M61a2 In M61 family | The character quarrels stones | The character provokes a quarrel between two stones of different breeds. To do this, he told everyone how the other supposedly spoke hostile or offensive towards the former. | 5 | 5 |
| M61a3 In M61 family | The character fights fish | The character tells each of two different species of fish how the other allegedly used to be hostile or offensive towards the former. Fish kill each other and the character prepares them to eat. | 7 | 6 |
| M61a4 In M61 family | He tells everyone that the other is dying | character lies to each of the spouses as if the other had a misfortune. They run to each other in panic. | 2 | 2 |
| M62a In M62 family | Incitement to quarrel (action) | The hero quietly damages each of the two characters; they accuse each other, quarrel, fight. | 73 | 69 |
| M62b In M62 family | When aiming at a hero, they hit each other | Two or more characters aim their weapons at the hero in between, but they hit each other. | 18 | 26 |
| M62c In M62 family | Tug of war, ATU 291 | A weak character takes turns negotiating with two strong ones to compete in a tug of war. They don't know they're pulling each other's rope or that they're tied to a tree. | 34 | 53 |
| M62d In M62 family | A hare in rotten skin | trickster wears rotten skin, pretends to be another animal, and says that the name (i.e. himself) has caused him to get sick. The animals are frightened, they do not dare to take revenge on the trickster for his tricks. See M62C motif. | 8 | 7 |
| M62e In M62 family | One field and two employees | A weak character alternately negotiates with two strong ones to cultivate the site. Each of the strong works in due time and does not know about the existence of the other. As a result, a weak character takes the entire crop. | 6 | 7 |
| M62f In M62 family | One assistant eats another | The character asks others to come to him (to help him with his work or get a debt). Those called come, each next one is stronger than the previous one and eats it (or the previous one runs away when they see him), the last two die when they fight each other. | 7 | 15 |
| M63 | An enumeration of body members | Before reaching the part of the body that is most suitable for certain purposes, others are named or tried. (Cf. Motive F22: The enumeration is related to finding the partner's genitals). | 52 | 61 |
| M64 | He pretends to own valuables | The character comes to the owner of valuables (food, fire) and pretends that he already owns them. As a result, valuables are made available (littoral is exposed at low tide, salmon spreads in waters, etc.). | 17 | 27 |
| M65 | The trickster was pinched and the meat was eaten | trickster bakes meat obtained by trick, deception; immobilized by sticking to a tree, ground, or stone; at this time, another character (fox, wolf, coyote, birds) eats all the meat. See M53 motif. | 29 | 50 |
| M65a In M65 family | A squeaky tree | The trees are creaking in the wind. Hearing a creak, the character climbs a tree and gets stuck. See M65 motif. | 18 | 1 |
| M65b In M65 family | Lost loot | Having resorted to deception, the character kills the game, but the thieves take the loot. See M53 motif. | 30 | 33 |
| M66 | The root eaten, J2154 | After eating certain foods frivolously or rubbing his body with his spine, the character suffers from itching, diarrhea, or an irrepressible eruption of intestinal gases. | 24 | 34 |
| M66a In M66 family | A mountain of excrement | After eating a certain food, the trickster leaves a mountain of excrement that is larger than himself. | 7 | 11 |
| M67 | The trickster was blown away by the wind | By stupidity or carelessness, the character causes a wind that blows him away. See the M66 motif (The Trickster emits a stream of intestinal gases). | 13 | 6 |
| M68 | When the winds blow, it scares the game | Because of his own stubbornness, the character suffers from an irrepressible gas eruption and scares away the game with a loud sound. Almost starves to death. | 12 | 10 |
| M69 | The head gets stuck in the skull | character is attracted by the inside of a large animal's skull (small animals or insects are dancing or feasting inside, or eating some meat); he sticks his head inside , it gets stuck. | 18 | 27 |
| M70 | The elder poisons the younger ones with intestinal gases | The oldest character poisons the youngest with his intestinal gases. | 14 | 16 |
| M70a In M70 family | A pierced old woman | A character on whom an old woman defecates or whose face blows the winds pierces her from below with a sharp object. See M70 motif. | 10 | 4 |
| M71 | Selected piece of wood | A character (usually carried away by a river or fallen from a height) turns into a piece of wood. Someone is picking it up. The character then takes on his true form, usually in the absence of the hosts. | 17 | 23 |
| M72 | Hand in the back of the tapir | The character puts his hand into the anus of a tapir or other large herbivore and is unable to pull it out. The animal rushes to run and drags a person with it for a long time. | 20 | 26 |
| M73 | Excretion substitution: who is stronger, K1721 | Two characters compare their excrement or vomit to learn about each other's diet and decide which of them is the more powerful beast. One of them manages to replace the selections. (Traditions in which vomiting is substituted are greasy). | 32 | 42 |
| M73a In M73 family | Substitution of feces | Two (animal) persons compare their feces (with different purpose). One of them gets to exchange them | 20 | 27 |
| M74 | Regurgitated food | A weak character regurgitates previously swallowed unusual food, or replaces his belching with a strong character's belching, or interprets his secretions as remains strong animals he ate. The strong believe that the weak are strong or have unusual abilities. | 22 | 27 |
| M74a In M74 family | Strange newborn names, ATU 15 | The character pretends to be invited to visit several times in connection with the birth of a child, or gives names to various tracts that the boat passes by. The names and titles sound strange, but they become clear when it turns out that the character ate supplies. | 87 | 91 |
| M74aa In M74 family | An imaginary visit | The character (several times) pretends to be his name (that he is going to visit), and eats up supplies himself. See M74A motif. | 71 | 44 |
| M74ab In M74 family | The fox is in the boat | Travelling in a boat or on a sledge, animal person (always the fox) steals food supplies or ruins objects and accordingly to his deeds, names different places. These names seem strange to the person’s companions (“River of broken arrows” and the like) | 17 | 23 |
| M74b In M74 family | Who ate the fat? | The character adjusts so that the sign that identifies the thief who ate supplies or who should be eaten is not on him, but on another character (smears with leftovers or with the secretions of your body of another, replaces secretions, etc.). | 53 | 57 |
| M74c In M74 family | Handsome as a woodpecker | Having noticed the woodpecker's beautiful plumage, the wolf or bear believes that the fox painted it and asks the fox to make him just as beautiful. The fox burns it alive. | 4 | 5 |
| M74d In M74 family | Who ate the kidneys? ATU 785 | God (the saint) travels with his companion. When he leaves, he eats the kidneys (heart, etc.) and says that the animal did not have kidneys. He continues to persist (even in the face of death), but confesses when he is promised wealth. | 31 | 18 |
| M74e In M74 family | Divides by biting off piece by piece | Two characters ask the third to share something edible between them. He bites off a little bit from each of the halves, because one or the other is slightly larger. As a result, it eats everything. | 3 | 3 |
Tradition and narrative counts are the stored catalogue totals for each entry.